


Out of my league

by seven7stars



Series: The Beautiful Game [1]
Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: Alternate Universe - Football, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Anal Sex, Casual Sex, Football | Soccer, Hotel Sex, M/M, Pining, Porn with Feelings, Smut, blasé attempts at football puns, or it would be if Damen could cope with that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-06
Updated: 2021-01-06
Packaged: 2021-03-16 15:48:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28584498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seven7stars/pseuds/seven7stars
Summary: Damen stands at the door to his hotel room, considering what's waiting on the other side. On the one hand, there's probably nothing - clean sheets, an empty bed, the disappointment of late-night television. On the other hand,the oppositionmight be in there, half-undressed and in the mood to do something about it.(Damen couldn't find the net during the match, but maybe there's still time to score tonight...)
Relationships: Damen/Laurent (Captive Prince)
Series: The Beautiful Game [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2133363
Comments: 37
Kudos: 213





	Out of my league

**Author's Note:**

> Apologies if this gets a bit accidentally British in places. This is an AU set very vaguely within the realms of football (aka soccer), but you don't need to follow football to read it. I'm pleased to say that it's sex with a sprinkling of context. (And balls.)

Damen stands outside his hotel room, staring down at the keycard in his hand.

_Open the door. Go inside and lock yourself in. Be done with this day and its damning bruises — take your shirt off, lie on the rock-hard sofa in your underwear, and order room service. Run up a disgustingly large bill for the club to pick up in the morning — it’s only fair. That’s one of the perks of playing for the best team in the league._

He frowns, rubbing his hands against his eyes.

Top of the league.

_Only just, after today._

Akielos F.C., one of the oldest, most well-respected football teams and Damen's club since he was a teenager, suffered a loss today — their first in months.

It was a two-nil drubbing courtesy of their arch-rivals; the _one_ team they need to beat each season to keep their dignity intact. Three precious points lost...if the title race comes down to the wire in June, today’s mistakes could prove costly. The trophy Damen craves, as Akielos’s captain and star striker, could slip from his grasp. From the _team’s_ grasp.

 _All my fault_ he thinks, as he swipes the card and sighs. Every bit of him aches, even after a hot shower and an ego massage, courtesy of his agent. _Don’t worry, Damianos — it’s just a setback. A temporary blip that’ll be forgotten by morning. We’ll get a win against Vere when they come to Ios in two weeks, and strengthen our lead at the top._

_At the top._

Damen swallows, tasting regret.

It doesn’t help, of course, that the opposition’s striker happens to be the (unrequited) love of his life. In theory, it should only lead to disaster a few times each year, when their teams meet on the pitch.

But increasingly, as the seasons roll by and little changes, Damen finds himself haunted by the same pair of blue eyes wherever he goes. Hair almost silver-white when he’s a blur on the pitch, running for goal. Lips parted to dish out insults and demands like he’s owed by one and all. Like he’s entitled, worthy of everyone’s worship.

 _He is,_ Damen thinks, stepping inside the darkened room. _He is worthy._

He tries to push the thought of Laurent from his mind. They haven’t hooked up in weeks — not since the second round of the Ellosean Cup, when their paths crossed briefly, on the road to face lesser enemies.

Damen’s team had won that day. A three-nil dismantling of Patras Rangers, followed by the fuck of a life time in the back of a rented car.

He feels his cheeks burn at the memory of Laurent, wet with sweat in the backseat. Burning up when he touched him, sliding his mouth around the head of his cock with a grin.

_Maybe I should call him, ask what he’s doing._

Damen laughs at himself. He sent five text messages after the match, none of them returned.

What else do champions do but gloat? Celebrate. Drink. Find another mouth to kiss, other arms to fall into…

He scowls.

_No, no calling him. He’s the reason I can’t think straight — if he hadn’t run ahead of me on the pitch earlier, bright as starlight, I wouldn’t have been so distracted._

_I wouldn’t have been the reason Akielos lost the match._

Damen simmers in regret, closing the door behind him. He stands in darkness for a moment, then feels around on the wall for a light switch. In the moment before the hotel room floods with frigid light he sees them, there behind his eyelids once again — blue eyes, dancing in his vision.

_Laurent. The darling of Vere Wanderers, the league’s poster child for perfection._

The way he burst into life, collapsing in rapturous joy as the final whistle was blown...his team mates swarming him, making a temporary god of him as he fell to his knees.

Damen was quietly happy. Delighted. That’s how weak he is, how badly he’s ruined their rivalry.

If he had this day again, he’d still want Laurent to win. He’d still want that smile to have been there on his face, as perfect as it was.

It’s a sad fact of life nowadays that Damen doesn’t have room in his head for much besides Laurent, radiant in shorts and shin pads.

He crosses the beige, bland desert of his nondescript room — the team was put up in a cheap hotel at the edge of the city, so they can make a quick escape in the morning — and drops his kit bag on a crumb-flecked sofa. His eyes stray across scuffed walls and a _very_ uninspiring bed, hoping to find something resembling a TV remote, so he can begin his self-exile with the news droning tiredly in the background.

 _No, not the news,_ he thinks with a surge of nausea. _Vere will be all over it, singing about today's victory over their great Akielon rivals._

_I’ll have to look at his face._

He suffers an intense recollection of Laurent’s face as it had looked some months ago, pressed close to his own in another anonymous hotel room. Laurent rode him to within an inch of his own life, that night. Damen had to lift him off and put him to bed, loose-limbed and wrecked.

_I want this day to be over._

He punishes himself with a glance at his phone. Nothing.

_I need this day to be done._

There’s no TV remote by the screen. Nothing on top of the creased menus or hotel directory, either. Damen moves the limp sofa cushions aside, then checks under the bed before giving up. There’s no button _on_ the television to operate, because that would make things too easy.

_It was a bad day and it meets a bad end._

_There’s poetry in it, you must admit._

“Damianos,” he says aloud to himself, raking fingers through his hair. It’s not yet dry from his shower, yet he’s already thinking of drowning himself again. Washing away the day beneath the heat. “Go to bed.”

It’s a sad fact that he finds his own voice unfamiliar. He has spent the day being shouted at from all quarters — by Akielos F.C.’s manager, furious in defeat. By his teammates, questioning his decision not to go in for the sliding tackle on Laurent, thus giving Vere a clear shot at goal.

He was screamed at by the fans, which hurt most of all.

_I deserve it. They travelled all this way, and for what? To watch a squad of overpaid players disappoint them from all angles. To watch Damianos, The Lion of Akielos, collapse at the heels of a pretty Veretian prince._

He sighs into his hand, trying not to let his many illicit encounters with Laurent play out in his mind. That way madness leads.

 _You’re not looking at your phone again tonight. He won’t text you_ — _hooking up is the furthest thing from his mind, after Vere’s glorious victory._

_He won’t think of you once._

Damen resigns himself to another shower, tossing his phone down on the bed.

_A hot one, hot enough to burn. Wash away this regret. This longing._

He nods to himself, unzipping his jacket and draping it over the television stand. He’s wearing one of his spare training shirts, lion logo rumpled and completely bereft of pride. A quick check of the room door confirms it’s locked, which is good, as the last thing he wants tonight is sympathetic company. The flimsy panel of wood shakes in the frame when he touches it, but it’ll do.

_One night. Just one night, then we’ll be on the road to Ios, putting blue eyes behind us._

He pulls the chain across the door, just in case. The bus will be here early in the morning and the team will load up, beginning the long drive south towards home. It doesn’t mean that some of them won’t stay up far too late tonight, filling their guts with beer and minds with worse ideas. Cursing their Veretian counterparts, analysing each second of the match to decipher where it all went wrong.

 _Me,_ Damen thinks, his stomach twisting sadly. _It went wrong the moment I kissed him, that first time in Lys. And the second time in Thrace._

It seemed like a game, the kind of challenge he craves — fucking the enemy under everyone’s noses.

_But Laurent...he’s not much of an enemy, is he?_

Damen wouldn’t put it past Nikandros and a few of the other defenders to come knocking for him after dark, needling him about the day’s disasters. _Got a soft spot for blond strikers have you, Damen? You’re meant to be chasing the ball, not Veretian ass._

He groans aloud, wishing for the torment to end.

Nikandros doesn’t know about that first time, or all the times after. No one does.

If any of Damen’s teammates find out he’s been fucking Laurent of Vere for the past year, he’ll never live it down. They might even want him off the team. And the fans, the _press?_

No, he can’t afford to lose himself down _those_ avenues. Not tonight, when he’s already five yards from despair.

_We lost the match, but it’s not over. We’re a point ahead of Vere in the league._

_We’re still winning._

Vere and their exquisite striker, who beat Damen to goal twice today. Who Damen knows, with agonising certainty, looks even _more_ exquisite with his hands tied above his head, flat on his back.

 _Legs in the air. One finger fucking his mouth whilst with your other hand, you_ —

Another groan. Images and memories from which there’s no escape. Laurent gets to sleep tonight knowing that he’s a single point behind Damen. He still isn’t top of the league.

And Damen will fall asleep hard and unhappy, wondering who’s _really_ winning.

He ransacks the depths of his thoughts for small comforts. Damen is still the league’s top striker, thus far this season — twenty goals and counting. He’s a handful ahead of Laurent, and as the number of matches remaining dwindles, unless Laurent scores hat tricks for the foreseeable future, it’s unlikely he’ll catch up.

_Yes, let’s cling to that. Think of the ball-shaped trophy you’ll be given on the last day of the season, for your efforts._

He frowns. He definitely shouldn’t be thinking about balls.

Damen stands in the middle of his soulless hotel room, despairing.

All of it, every single personal achievement he might assume in his career, pales in comparison to the team’s legacy.

_We have to win the league. Akielios must be champions._

Let the rest of his team drown their sorrows and amusement in the bottom of pint glasses. He’ll go to bed early and wake rested, ready to begin again. Ready to hit the training ground as soon as they reach home, and prepare for the next match.

Ready to forget about Laurent of Vere, and the freckle he knows sits right _there_ , on the inside of his left thigh. Damen has kissed that freckle, run his tongue across it — he has pressed his thumb against it as he drove his cock inside Laurent’s —

_Stop. Enough. It’s done._

From across the room, Damen can see his phone. The screen is black and unblinking. _No new messages._

Resolved, he turns to face the bathroom door and let the drowning commence. He’s not expecting much in the way of luxury, after surveying the sterile mundanity of his room.

And he’s definitely _not_ expecting to see a strip of light, leaking from beneath a closed door.

Time slows. Damen looks around in confusion.

_I’m alone. The rest of the team went their way, and I went mine._

_So who’s in the bathroom?_

He takes the keycard from his pocket and checks the number: 204. He _knows_ that’s the same number as what’s on the door — he stood out there long enough, sulking. _Thinking._ He throws the card down on a stained coffee table and walks to the bathroom, kicking off his trainers and holding one behind his back, as if it’s any sort of defence.

He puts his ear to the wood. No running water, no voices. Teams keep their hotel choices quiet to avoid unwanted attention, but it’s not impossible that a rabid fan trailed the team’s bus in a taxi, tweeting out locations...

If someone were here to rob him — or beg for an autograph, it’s happened before — would they really make a stand in the _bathroom?_

He reminds himself of who he is and all he’s done in life. _You’re_ _Damianos of Akielos F.C. You signed a contract last year worth more than fifty million. You took the Lions from middle-of-the-table to the top. The pinnacle of the First League._

He pulls open the bathroom door, suddenly furious. 

And three things happen to immediately shatter his confidence.

First, Damen understands he is _not_ being robbed. At least not of much beyond his pride.

Second, he drops the trainer he was holding.

Third, he meets with the same eyes he’s been haunted by since he limped off the pitch this afternoon and climbed onto the bus, defeated and repentant.

Laurent.

Laurent of Vere Wanderers, here in his shitty hotel bathroom.

 _And is he...was he_ undressing himself _in there?_

Damen jolts with the shock of it all, stumbling back and tripping over the traitorous trainer, ending up in an ungraceful heap on the carpet. He scrabbles back on his elbows, looking up at the spectre of all that haunts him, made real — lithe, blond and wholly unattainable. Laurent stumbles over him on his way out of the bathroom, clutching a scratchy-looking towel to his chest.

“Damen, wait — I…”

It _is_ Laurent — no question about it. Nobody else would have the gall to hide in his arch rival’s bathroom, hair wet and shoulders covered in a towel, with too-short shorts hanging off his hips.

His hair’s a shock of blond on his shoulders, almost white under the room’s unforgiving lights — Damen has to shield his eyes and look away.

_Too much. You’re always too much._

Whatever fumbling explanation Laurent was hoping to offer, it dies in the space between them. Flashes of the match replay in Damen’s mind once again — his aborted sliding tackle, leading to the first goal. The body check he absolutely did not need to conduct with such force, sending Laurent flying and the referee reaching for his yellow card (Damen’s fifth of the season — he’ll be suspended for their next away match, which is probably for the best).

He twists, still very much sprawled on the carpet, staring up as Laurent checks the lock on the door.

“Oh, the chain’s on. Very good. You’ll bring the entire hotel up here.”

Damen winces. Laurent’s voice is a hiss, a slither — and yes, a temptation. He sounds tired, words rasping as they twist from his lips. Even though Vere won today, it wasn’t a gracious victory — Akielos ran them ragged with dirty tackles and rough interferences, from kick-off to full-time. If Laurent isn’t bruised blue by morning, it’ll be a miracle.

Damen has a hard time keeping himself composed. He’s suddenly overtaken by the memory of Laurent, down an alleyway in Delpha, Damen’s teeth marking a winding path from ankle to — 

_Suffering. So much suffering._

_Don’t, Damianos._

It’s Nik’s voice he hears in his head. The disappointment. It’s remarkably sobering.

Damen extricates himself from the carpet, staring shamelessly as Laurent inspects a drab countryside landscape, hanging crookedly from the far wall.

He’s nervous, Damen realises.

_That makes two of us._

“I thought Akielos would be able to afford better accommodations for their players.”

It’s a snide observation, though it’s made without venom — Laurent turns to face Damen, and can hardly meet his eyes. He clutches the towel and stares at the carpet.

“You’re here,” Damen hears himself say. _Is this…?_

“I wanted to see you.” Laurent says it quietly, barely more than a whisper, red splashed across his cheeks. “I didn’t want to leave it like...like _that.”_

Damen closes his eyes. There’s no need to say more — Laurent sinking to his knees in victory, as Damen dropped to his own in defeat.

Anyone else, any other Veretian player, and Damen would think they wanted to rub salt in the wound. Come back for another round of whipping Damen’s confidence, as if that hadn’t happened enough on the pitch.

But with Laurent, it’s not like that. Their rivalry is all for show — a performance for the cameras and sports blogs and supporters.

When they’re together, they...it’s…

 _It’s different,_ Damen thinks.

He almost says as such. Almost, but not quite.

“It’s only for one night,” he mutters, folding his arms. There’s no reason for him to feel defensive about the hotel room — it truly is an eyesore. _We’ve fucked in worse,_ he thinks, remembering the hostel down by the river in Marches. _Do you remember worrying that the walls were going to fall down around us?_ “I’m surprised such places exist in Vere.”

That hits a sour note. Damen feels a twinge of regret as Laurent’s face falls. He hadn’t meant to snap — rather, he was trying to be funny. But there are too many tightened nerves in the room, too much tension between them. And Damen might be the physical specimen on the pitch, but Laurent’s a snake in the grass — if he feels backed into a corner, he bites. He’ll say something neither of them can take back.

On paper, for the sport’s sake, they’ve been enemies for years. Season after season of slander and anticipation. It’s to the point now where Damen can barely stand it — the press build-up, the insults, the rough handling. He’s recognisable wherever he goes in Ios — last time Laurent was there for a pre-season friendly, they weren’t able to meet up at all. There were too many eyes on them, everywhere they turned.

The last few head-to-heads between Akielos and Vere have gone Damen’s way, but more than ever, they feel increasingly like losses. He cost his team the match today with his clumsy mistakes; the thought of losing Laurent, and what little they have...it’s too much.

_I refuse. No more defeat._

Damen licks his lips and watches Laurent, still pretending to be intensely interested in the terrible painting.

_I won’t lose to you twice in one day._

“Laurent,” he says, lowering himself onto the uncomfortable sofa. He leans back, arms stretched behind his head. He waits for Laurent to turn, choosing his words carefully. “Congratulations for your win. You deserved it; your goals were spectacular.”

Laurent looks at him, twisting long strands of hair over his shoulder. His self-control is, in most situations, beyond admirable.

But Damen feels hope build as he watches Laurent give in a little, his eyes wandering over Damen’s chest, down to where his pants gather at his hips. He’s weathered this gaze many times before, and it’s never less than glowing — knowing that Laurent looks at _him_ like this, and no one else. The slow, languorous lowering of lashes, the way his lips part...yes, Damen likes how it feels to be watched in this way.

He shifts his hips, letting his knees fall open. Laurent does well not to let his eyes drift again; but still, Damen can see he’s bringing him to the place he wants him. Where he always wants Laurent to be — on the edge of a careless precipice that Damen longs to tip him over. Knock him off his stride, onto his back.

When Laurent’s wandering eyes have finally, finally snaked their way down to his crotch, Damen pounces (verbally).

“I missed you. I didn’t think we were going to meet tonight; I sent you messages.”

There’s a moment where he thinks it’s going to be that easy. Damen will win in the usual way — Laurent, overwhelmed, will wilt against him. _Take me,_ he’ll say, clothes off before he can offer to help. _Fuck me, Damen. I don’t want to think._

But the blankness returns to Laurent’s features. Nerves and wariness, conspiring to keep them on opposing teams. Just for now.

“I wasn’t sure,” he says, tipping back his chin and feigning confidence. Damen can see red spreading down his neck, but he doesn’t falter. If anything, the splash of colour makes Laurent bolder — he takes a shaky step towards the sofa. Towards Damen.

From ankle to thigh, his legs are bare and sun-kissed. Light blond hair, nearly standing on end. Before the season started, Vere would have indulged in a long summer of pre-season training. Damen has spent several excruciating nights dreaming about _that._

“What weren’t you sure about?” Damen tries to keep his voice even, but it’s difficult.

_He’s beautiful. He’s here._

He watches Laurent’s throat as he swallows, a laborious movement. He wants to kiss him there, wants to mark him with a bruise.

“About tonight. Coming here, I…” Laurent clears his throat. “I expected you wouldn’t want to see me. After today.”

Laurent flicks his hair back, and Damen watches it fall again, tickling his neck.

_Fuck._

“You were in my shower,” he hears himself say. _Stupid, stupid, stupid._

Laurent looks at the ceiling. He’s still wearing that ridiculous towel. And those shorts...aren’t they—

“I got here a short time ago; my bodyguard let me in through the staff entrance. No one else knows I’m here.” He hesitates, dragging his tongue along his lower lip. Damen watches its progress with great interest. _Oh, the things I would do with that tongue tonight. If only_ — “I didn’t have a chance to shower at the ground.”

No, Damen supposes he didn’t. By the time the post-match interviews were done and the media dealt with, followed by the weary trudge back to the locker room...Damen knows how it is, when all around you are drunk on victory, but you want to be gone. Laurent would have been last back to the locker room and first out of it, exhausted beyond care.

For the first time since opening the bathroom door, he allows his own resolve to fracture. His eyes slide down to where he hasn’t dared look until now. The shorts and towel combination leaves _nothing_ to the imagination.

There’s something unusual about those shorts, actually. Something not quite right.

It takes a second, and then it hits Damen like the worst sort of plot twist.

_That badge...it isn’t the twin stars of Vere. Silver against navy, a star in the sea._

_These shorts are red. Gold on blood. Akielos F.C...he’s wearing Akielon shorts._

And because he’s the dictionary definition of a tease, they’re at least a size too small. He must have stolen them from a merchandise stand.

“Take those off,” Damen says, before he can help himself. “Right now. Take the shorts off.”

 _Why_ , for the love of fuck, is he suddenly incapable of looking anywhere else? The golden lion of Akielos, stretched across Laurent’s thigh…

It’s not right. It’s…

He has a sudden vision of himself on his knees with his teeth scraping the logo, tugging at material with his teeth.

He closes his eyes.

“Damen, are you…” Laurent’s voice fades as fingers pull at the fabric self-consciously, increasing Damen’s agony. “Should I leave?”

Damen looks up, hands in his lap. Laurent is lost, head tipped on one side. He still hasn’t removed the offending shorts.

Damen grips the arm of the sofa and commits structural damage he has no doubt will be added to his room bill, come morning.

“No one knows you’re here.”

Laurent shifts, runs a hand through his hair. “No. This is Vere — I know how to go unnoticed.”

Damen nods, resisting the urge to let his mind race ahead of his body. To become entranced by the promise of sweat, and lips, and heat, before it’s become a reality.

“My teammates won’t disturb us.”

As if to make a promise of it, Damen reaches for his phone, fumbling to switch it off. He places it on the table, lingering on Laurent’s legs again. There’s a mark there, on the side of his calf — Damen wonders if he was responsible.

He wonders if he’ll be allowed to leave more, fingerprints claiming Laurent as his own.

“I was thinking about you,” Laurent says quietly. “After the match. I thought you might have left Vere early...nobody saw you leave the ground.”

Damen shrugs. “It seemed best to slip out unseen. I’m not a popular man tonight.”

He’s trying to think if there’s any other reason Laurent would be here, in his hotel room after dark. Half-undressed and hopeful, wearing the enemy’s shorts. They’ve pushed things before — fists curled in collars, playing rough with one another. One body shoving another against a cubicle wall.

But this...this is new. Even for someone like Laurent, who lives to surprise.

He’s starting, as foolish as it feels, to _hope._

_He knows I have feelings for him; I’ve hardly hidden it. It’s Laurent who walks away each time, who keeps me at a distance._

Damen watches as Laurent’s hands shift along his waistband, sliding the fabric down one hip to catch an itch. This is how Damen notices the first of many things sure to spell his doom tonight — Laurent isn’t wearing underwear. Stolen Akielos F.C. kit, and nothing else.

“We have a match in two days.” The words aren’t his own — it’s Nikandros, as usual, who enters his head. Trying to speak sense into him. Nik’s suspicious that Damen has a secret lover, hidden from the team as they tour. _If only he knew._ “Tomorrow will be lost to travelling and training. It would be wise for me to sleep.” _Rest, recover, run._

It’s a weakness to admit such a thing, and a cruelty. Damen stands up to linger by the bed as Laurent’s face floods with disappointment.

Damen is, of course, too weak to continue the ruse.

By now, most of him has already committed to allowing the mystery of Laurent, wearing his rival’s shorts and a fraying hotel towel, to unravel before him.

_No sex between matches. I’ve broken that rule far more often than I should._

He can’t help but take a final look at that most damning of sartorial choices.

_I really fucking wish he’d take those shorts off._

And then, at the crux of the matter — _I want to take them off for him._

Laurent steps to the edge of the bed. “I’ll go if you want me to.” Damen can’t meet his eye. “If that’s what you want.”

_No, it’s not what I want._

_I want this, and then more of this._

Damen feels his feet moving, closing the distance. His hands come up to cup Laurent’s face, cheeks soft beneath the rough skin of his thumbs. He knows he’s never looked upon anything so lovely. The wonders of the world, contained within a person.

_I want this, every night._

He’s leaning in, kissing soft lips, drawing a sound from Laurent that’s so lovely he’ll be intensely reliving it, next time he’s lacing up his boots. Another fragment to carry with him, when he should be thinking about anything else.

“What do you want, Laurent?” he asks, enjoying the other man’s shudder at the sound of his own name. _I know the answer, but I’ll hear you say it. I'll have your pleasure for my own.  
_

“You,” Laurent sighs, winding his hands into Damen’s hair. The towel drops to the carpet, and then Damen’s hands are moving over bare skin, honed muscle and bone. “I want you. _Now.”_

Damen lifts the hem of his training shirt and pulls it over his head. He gives Laurent a long moment to drink him in, palm passing over the taut muscles of his abdomen, his skin a pleasing splash of cream against bronze.

Laurent pouts prettily as he admires Damen, leaning against the bed. He rests a knee on the mattress, stretching the fabric of ( _not_ ) his shorts — another torturous flash of lion.

There’s a moment in which Damen aches, though for what exactly, he couldn’t say.

Then, sliding a hand around Laurent’s waist, he gives in to it.

“Get on the bed.”

You hear the phrase _“his knees buckled”_ and perhaps don’t think too hard about what it means or might look like, but Damen knows it’s a glory. Laurent practically collapses as he moves past Damen to do as he’s bid, though before he can crawl across the mattress, Damen has another thought and grabs his wrist.

“Make up your mind,” Laurent says petulantly.

He’s standing next to Damen’s bed, in Damen’s team’s shorts, his hair drying in appealing waves.

He’s every bit a vision of temptation and bad ideas.

Damen holds up his training shirt and tosses it at Laurent. “Put this on, and take off the shorts.”

Part of him wants the shorts left on, but that would impede his remaining plans for the evening. Still, for a moment as Laurent behaves himself and pulls the shirt over his head, Damen enjoys the vista of something wholly unexpected — his arch-rival, dressed in the red and gold of Akielos.

He likes it more than he can say.

_I’m a weak man. In the eightieth minute of the game, he blatantly committed a foul at the edge of the penalty box. The referee took one look into his big, blue eyes and declared no harm done._

_That’s me. I’m the referee._

_And he’s the lion tearing me apart._

The shirt’s too big, grazing the hems of Laurent’s stolen merchandise. He smirks at Damen, running a finger under his jaw, before climbing onto the bed. On any other day, Damen would say it’s the most unappealing bed he’s ever seen. But with Laurent bent over it…

“I hurt your feelings today.”

It’s an astute observation.

“You won a football match, that’s all.”

Damen doesn’t turn to look. He knows what he’ll see — Laurent reclining against the headboard, working himself into a state. He can hear a hand moving under fabric, going all the places Damen longs to be.

A blush threatens to spoil his composure, but he refuses to give in. When he _does_ glance over his shoulder it’s to find that Laurent’s worked up all over, from the tips of his ears to his cheeks, down his neck and disappearing into the shirt. 

It doesn’t look at all like surrender — if anything, he’s flushed with victory.

_Twice in one day._

_I did this to myself._

“Take the shorts off,” Damen growls, doing his best to resist the frisson of thrill that comes with it. “They’re not yours, and I highly doubt you paid for them.”

An impish grin. Laurent pulls the shirt up carelessly, giving Damen a flash of navel. He’s the smaller man, but he’s built like a footballer — strong, graceful, efficient. Damen’s going to be thinking about the look on his face right now for days and weeks. It may never leave him completely.

_Between that look and those legs, I’m ruined._

“You’re quite right, dear brute. I obtained these shorts,” Laurent says, slipping his thumbs inside the waistband. Damen looks away, out of both respect and self-preservation. “Through means both illegal and illicit.” He pauses in his torment, feigning pensiveness. “I suppose the Akielon Lions _would_ look better on the floor, where they belong. Should I take them off?”

Damen feels any aspirations he had for an early night sinking down, down, down through the carpet and floorboards, to the very depths of his immeasurable desire. 

_I’m going to die,_ he thinks, _and this is what ends me. Two blue eyes and an elasticated waistband._

He turns his body towards Laurent on the bed, hearing Nik’s judgmental voice in his head again, denouncing every despicable thing he’s thinking of doing. _Forgive me, Nikandros. I tried, I really did._

_But he’s in my room and the lions are on the floor._

“Laurent, I have to get up at five in the morning.”

Laurent eyes Damen darkly, kicking off the shorts. He blinks lazily and lets his knees fall open. He’s sitting up with his back against the headboard.

Damen was right. He’s not wearing underwear.

“Why bother sleeping, then? Let me keep you up.”

Damen bites his lip to hold back a retort.

Laurent raises an eyebrow. “Is this the great Damianos, exercising _restraint?_ Well, there _is_ a first time for everything.”

He’s doing well to contain himself, but though the Akielos shirt reaches the tops of Laurent's legs, Damen can see that he’s painfully hard. His eyes are glassy, his mouth wet.

They’re far past the point of no return. Damen wonders when that happened.

_Phone off. Door locked. No disturbances._

Damen feels his own erection rubbing against his pants.

_Time for kick-off._

Laurent’s touching himself idly, head lolling back. “If you aren’t fucking me within the next five minutes, I’m going to wonder _why._ My free kick today, the second goal — did it hurt you this badly?”

That riles Damen up. He’s crawling across the bed and pushing Laurent down before he can help himself, hands pinching into the delicate skin of his wrists, holding them above his head.

“I’ve changed my mind; take the shirt off,” he demands, staring at the lion badge. He’s turned on far beyond any reasonable measure. Laurent squirms beneath him, Damen’s knees either side of his hips to pin him in place. “We are _not_ going to talk about the match.”

 _It’s not right,_ he thinks, looking down at Laurent spilled beneath him like his own shattered resolve. _It’s not right, how much I want this._

“I’m keeping it on.”

Laurent sucks his lip, and Damen stares at his teeth.

Then they’re kissing, hard and frantic, and Damen forgets all about the shirt. His mouth trails along Laurent’s jaw and into the dip of his neck, his body sliding between Laurent’s parted knees until they’re pressed together.

There’s still far too much clothing between them, but that’s possibly for the best. Damen settles his weight on top of Laurent, his cock hard and heavy against the softer skin of his thigh, and for a horrifying second he thinks he might come.

He doesn’t. But it’s a close thing.

“Fancy that,” Laurent breathes, hot against his ear. His hips roll, and it’s all Damen can do not to moan expletives like a mantra. “It looks like you might score today, after all.”

Damen silences him with a growl, claiming his mouth in a kiss that’s half bite, both of them pushing back at the other. It’s a battle between them — it always has been. A battle for attention, for glory and adoration.

When they break apart for breath, Damen holds himself up, enjoying the way Laurent’s hands and eyes roam over him, drinking him in.

“What?” he asks, kissing along ivory collarbones. “Nothing clever to say?”

Laurent, trapped and yet still somehow the victor, wraps his legs around Damen’s hips to pull him closer.

“I don’t think I need to say anything.”

Laurent’s ankles cross behind his thighs, and then they’re rutting against each other, Damen’s hands releasing Laurent’s wrists so that they might drift down his fine lines and curves, settling at the hem of his shirt.

“Do you need me to say it in Akielon?” Laurent murmurs, licking Damen’s lower lip. “The shirt stays on.”

And it does, though Damen dares to push it up, skin finding skin as they grind against each other again, hands and teeth and heat burning sweetly in a bland hotel room.

Damen can’t stand it for much longer. His cock, a painful throb, is pressed against Laurent’s leg, and the scratch of his pants is more pain than pleasure.

“Tick tick,” Laurent says, smirking as Damen sits up, finally tugging at his own waistband. “I’d say your five minutes are down to two.”

Damen doesn’t say that it’s far more than he’ll need, in his current state. It’s embarrassing how hard he is; he pulls his cock free of his underwear, stepping off the bed and out of everything at once. He’s leaking between his fingers. It’s a predicament, a mild embarrassment, another long list of petty victories for Laurent to claim as his own.

He looks down at him, there on the bed. Laurent is gripping himself, eyes fixed on Damen’s hand as it moves in slow, agonising circles over the head of his cock.

He knows Laurent wants it. _Needs_ it.

He asked once, after one of their dalliances, if Laurent was fucking anybody else. Another player, or one of the coaches who stare after him greedily. The question seemed to come as a surprise.

 _“Damianos,”_ he’d replied then, glistening in the afterglow. _“Have you looked at yourself? These mortals do not compare.”_

He swallows, a thrall to the memory.

“Turn over,” he says, seizing control.

 _That night...we were in Vask for a tournament. Final week of the season. He was so needy_ — _I refused to fuck him until he was down on his knees on the balcony, begging._

How things change.

“And shut your mouth for five seconds, for the love of god.”

Something sparks in Laurent's eyes — there’ll be no argument about this. He turns onto his stomach, sliding down the bed to place his head on a starched pillow. Damen likes how he looks there — complacent, vaguely cooperative for a change. His cock is leaking deliciously onto the sheets.

Damen takes a shaky breath and returns to his kit bag. There’s a side pocket containing a few essentials, kept on hand in times of wishful thinking (and long nights spent alone, with few other distractions beyond blue eyes and wicked thoughts). Lubricant, condoms, an unloved cock ring.

The sound Laurent makes a moment later when Damen pushes a slicked finger inside him, well. He’s going to remember it long after the season’s finished and the party’s died away.

He watches, satisfied and burning, as Laurent twists his hands under the pillows, biting down on his lip hard enough for a bead of blood to spring up, violent against white and the sheen of his skin.

Damen pushes in again, imagining how such heat will feel around him, spreading lubricant on his other fingers. The temptation to rush is real, an urgency — he has to resist touching himself, racing to an end at the sight of Laurent on all fours before him, shirt rucked up, the taut expanse of his back half-exposed.

_I’d turn the light off but I want to see this._

_Every last inch and shudder._

When he adds a second finger, Laurent makes a sound so pretty Damen has to still himself and close his eyes.

Laurent arches his back, thrusting against the friction, head bowed in worship of something out of reach.

 _Make another clever joke about my performance today,_ Damen thinks, working his fingers in further. They set a tempo, and Damen has to look everywhere but where his hand moves between Laurent’s legs. His other hand snakes around to stroke at Laurent’s cock, as lovely as the rest of him, and still satisfyingly hard. The moan this earns him is worth every failed pass and missed interception; every barbed comment and disappointed look from a teammate.

 _Mine,_ he thinks vaguely, leaning down to kiss the back of Laurent’s neck. _Three points and a championship title._

_They can take it all. The trophy, for this._

Minutes later, Laurent is a shaking mess beneath him, lying flat against the bed. Damen briefly considers removing the Akielos shirt — he might get away with it, with Laurent in this state — but he’s accepted that he likes how it looks. He likes everything about Laurent wearing his colours.

Laurent rolls onto his back and pushes his hair out of his face, eyes wide. He commits an unforgivably illegal move, letting his legs fall open again and gripping himself, tipping his head back in pleasure.

 _Could I come if I watched him?_ he wonders. Sit back and watch as Laurent works himself over, spilling onto himself, architect of his own ecstasy...

But Damen won’t be a spectator, he can’t. The challenge was set, and meet it he must.

He folds his hand over Laurent’s fingers, and together they slide along his length. Once, twice, three times.

“Damen...I’m afraid you’re out of time…”

His voice is a gasp, a stuttering rhythm. Damen kisses him, tightening his grip and savouring the reaction, thumb swiping over the head of his cock. He briefly thinks about taking Laurent in his mouth — he’s done it before. Aside from a crushing victory on the pitch, he counts it amongst his favourite things in life.

But he can see Laurent’s free hand snaking down between his legs, rubbing at himself, and Damen knows where the night takes him next.

He sits back on his knees, letting Laurent get a good look at him, naked and ready. Laurent’s still touching himself, though the pace falters in anticipation.

“On all fours?” he asks, though Damen has already decided what he wants.

“No,” he breathes, gripping Laurent’s hip. “I want you on your back tonight.”

_I want to look at you._

_I want to see you, on the edge and then over it._

After a moment lost in awe, Damen prepares himself, spreading lubricant over his hand and cock, positioning himself between Laurent’s legs.

“Who knew you had it in you,” Laurent teases, though he makes no attempt to move and instead lets go of himself, eyes on what he covets. “I thought you were going to cry when the referee blew his whistle.”

 _I wanted to,_ Damen thinks, stealing a kiss as he shifts, pressing against Laurent’s rim. He watches eagerly as the moan escapes from Laurent’s lips, and aches to repeat it. He pushes against him again, and it’s a close thing. A precipice he’s ready to breach. _Again and again. The walls of the room are thin; let’s make them move._

He shifts his weight, Laurent’s legs locking around his own again, pulling him close. His cock edges inside, every moment of it agonising, tugging at Laurent’s lip with his teeth.

“Damen,” Laurent pants, and there are no clever cruelties left in his head. Only wanting, and writhing, and begging. “Damen, yes, please — fuck, _yes_ , I want —”

Damen enters Laurent slowly, one hand gripping his leg, holding it back against the bed. The other winds up his ( _Damen’s_ ) shirt, palm flat against his spine.

All worry about the match, any need to get even fades as Damen fucks into him, hard and slow and taunting, hips seeking a rhythm as further memories of the match come back to him. Each push, each tease, each tackle.

 _I will have this,_ Damen thinks as Laurent’s head tips back. He licks a line along his jaw, whispers it into his skin. _I will have you, if only for now._

_You were so shy that first time. Look at you now._

Laurent hadn't even been able to articulate what he wanted, during their first few late-night meetings. He said he'd never spoken about these things aloud, never felt comfortable enough.

Damen unpicked him patiently, like a difficult knot.

They’re fucking hard now, Damen pushing deeper as Laurent bucks his hips. It’s bound to leave bruises; the thought of Laurent, marked and senseless, only drives him on all the more desperately. They move together, and it’s more than a game or sport. It’s months and years of pent-up longing — the hope that this will happen, a hundred times over, again and again. In other cities, other darkened hotel rooms. In his own apartment in Ios, curtains closed to the world. He hasn’t had Laurent in his own bed yet; their liaisons happen on the understanding that they keep things secret and impersonal.

But Damen doesn’t want that now, if he ever did before.

Damen wants so much more than he can say.

He tries to show a sliver of that want in the way he moves over Laurent, in the sounds he coaxes with aching loveliness from the other man’s lips. Laurent’s close; they’ve been here before. He reaches down to stroke his cock and entice him across the goal line, Laurent thrusting against his hand.

It’s an honour, not an expectation, when Laurent comes first, with a gasp of incomprehension. It’s the sort of victory Damen would never boast about; he’ll keep it for himself, to replay on nights alone lost to missing someone ( _this_ someone). Summon the memory in inconvenient moments — when he’s tying the laces on his boots, when he’s discussing tactics with the defence.

Laurent, undone beneath him. Sticky with come, red-cheeked and breathless.

_There’s no one on this earth who could defend against this._

Damen thrusts harder, Laurent impossibly tight around him, and comes soon after this thought.

He finds the collapse was worth the climb.

* * *

Later, in the darkest part of night, Damen wakes to watch moonlight steal in beneath the curtains.

The fan overhead whirs, something within it broken. Every few seconds it catches and stutters, like a skipped heartbeat or scratched record.

His eyes are closed and his breath comes evenly, on his back with his arms around Laurent, who’s sleeping soundly (though Damen has a mind to wake him soon — it’s not yet two, meaning there’s time enough for a rematch).

He squeezes tighter at the thought of leaving, an instant resistance. _Back to our “rivalry”. Acting for cameras and columnists._

Laurent sighs, shifting in his arms, and Damen hopes he’s awake. He doesn’t want to face where his thoughts might go, unaccompanied.

“Damen,” comes a whisper, hair tickling his chin. “Why aren’t you sleeping?”

He presses a kiss against Laurent’s forehead, fingers dancing a pattern down his arm.

“I’d rather not. If I sleep, I leave you behind.”

_I don’t want that._

_I’d take you with me, if I could._

Amusement curls into Laurent’s voice as he slides away, holding himself up until he’s a silhouette against moonlight.

“Vere will travel to Ios in two weeks for our away match — I’ll see you then.” A kiss given in darkness, which Damen eagerly reaches up for. “If you want your precious Lions to finish top of the league, you’ve work to do.”

The sombre mood is instantly shattered, Damen rising once again to meet Laurent’s offensive, flipping them until _he’s_ hanging above like a vicious star, with kisses for weapons.

 _I would choose this over the game,_ he thinks, and he supposes he might let that become known soon. Perhaps in two weeks when they’re in Ios, wrapped up in each other after the match.

_Will he want to meet in a hotel, one of the luxury resorts along the beachfront? Or can I coax him back to my apartment, finding a way to go unseen._

Another thought: _Two weeks. Can I wait that long?_

“Tell me what you want,” Laurent whispers, a daydream beneath him. A thought that comes to you in the middle of the night; the sort you can never let go of, completely. “There are still three hours until you leave. We should make the most of it.”

Damen runs his fingers over soft skin and dips down for another kiss.

“I want you,” he says quietly. _You’re worth more than any prize._ “Like this.”

He doesn’t elaborate. Laurent doesn’t ask him to. They’ll greet the morning as a tangle of limbs and kisses, sighs exchanged as sentiment.

“Let’s get you out of your head,” Laurent whispers. “I need your mind in the game.”

Damen smiles, letting go of all thought.

He thinks, as he parts Laurent’s knees with his arm, that no matter what happens at the end of the season, he’s already won. Every mile run on trimmed grass, every ball kicked, every goal scored — and yes, each bitter loss — has brought him closer to this.

Closer to victory.

“Take the shirt off,” he says, twisting his fingers into a sleeve. “Sit on my lap.”

The lion in his bed does as he’s told.


End file.
